felt_tips said
Good suggestions, Quosik. I’d just like to add that an updated rating system would not only be fairer to authors, but also much more useful to buyers.

I know I’m pretty late to this party but I couldn’t find another thread like it and I certainly don’t want to let it die now that I’ve seen improvement lately. I LOVE that I can see a breakdown of the ratings, but it’s still missing that key feature to make it fair: reviews! I personally believe this would help you quite a bit because neither customers nor sellers can rely on the ratings to be accurate. You mentioned that buyers now have the option to re-rate something, but would they? If the remark they left was about a bug, and now you can see that it’s been fixed since the comment, you know to disregard it. I’ve purchased plenty of plugins where I felt it deserved better ratings and I’m left wondering, “what did they do to earn that 1 star?”

As a seller, I know customers can overreact sometimes and give you a one star because they are angry, not because your product was malfunctioning. Or if it doesn’t do EVERYTHING they want it, your score suffers even though it can complete everything you’ve listed in the description.

It seems like a win win situation for everyone including Envato, does it not? Thanks for listening!

bolderelements said
You mentioned that buyers now have the option to re-rate something, but would they?

We do. Generally new themes and plugins get fast updates, quick responses to bugs and authors are keen to impress new buyers so everyone’s happy and we give a high rating. A few months down the line you find the bugs you reported haven’t been fixed and the author has abandoned your theme to concentrate on new products. Or the ‘extra value’ plugins bundled with your theme are now out of date and have potential security issues so you have to disable them or pay for another copy to get the latest, secure version. In this instance we’ll mark down a previously high rating to something that matches the current level of service and performance.

It doesn’t happen often but if support for a product improves, or the author adds more features to attract new buyers then we’ll increase our rating.

Ratings are only relevant if they reflect the current status of the product, plugins and any additional advertised services.

I appreciate that there are some customers out there who do it, I’m not saying there are none, I just don’t have trust that everyone will. As I seller, I received a couple one star ratings because buyers blew out of proportion a small bug that was fixed relatively quickly but not quick enough according to one. Another single star came from someone because I didn’t respond to their post within 2 days. Crazy things do happen and it hurts. It took me a long while to get enough ratings to clear out those single stars. Now, as a buyer, I ignore the ratings and go straight to the comments. It’s a lot to sift through, but I feel that’s the only way to know if an author really cares and supports their products. I just think that adding reviews alongside the rating will allow me to sift through the ratings from people being constructive and honest, and those who are letting their emotions get in the way. Very few e-commerce sites nowadays don’t have this option.

bolderelements said
Now, as a buyer, I ignore the ratings and go straight to the comments. It’s a lot to sift through, but I feel that’s the only way to know if an author really cares and supports their products. I just think that adding reviews alongside the rating will allow me to sift through the ratings from people being constructive and honest, and those who are letting their emotions get in the way.

I wouldn’t ignore ratings completely – if a product has 3 or less stars then it’s unlikely to be as a result of ‘those who are letting their emotions get in the way’. +1 for the comments addition though – useful not just for protecting authors interests but to alert buyers as to potential issues with products and/or bundled services.

Today one of my customer request a new feature for my item. I gently suggest him to find a developer for this request. And then what happened. I got a shiny 1 star rating. Is this normal? Definitely we need a description area for rated under 2 star. This have to be a requirement.

We spent lots of time for create a theme and this type 1 star ratings make me very sad. Envato please solve this problem.